The Dead Speak Ill Of The Living (The Dead Speak Paranormal Mysteries Book 1)

by Robert Wilde

  “Right, let’s get some answers before it rains.”

  They walked with as much nonchalance as you can have into a park when it was night.

  “Actually,” Pohl asked, “why is this open at night? Isn’t it dangerous?”

  “We advise women to avoid it. But too many people cut through for it to be closed. The problem of a town growing up round it.”

  “Good thing she didn’t trip over a duck,” Nazir said, looking at the lake.

  “You’re all heart.”

  “Ducks are bastards. They operate on sea and on land. Sneaky bastards.”

  “We’re here,” Maquire announced, so Joe put the machine on the rucksack on the ground and turned it on.

  “Is anybody here?” he asked, and they waited.

  And waited.

  “Anyone at all? In the park? Anywhere?”

  “Arse,” Maquire complained. “You think there’d be someone here.”

  “Looks like it’s empty.”

  Maquire stood back up and sighed. “It was always going to be a longshot, and we’ve got two more locations to check. Maybe we’ll have better luck next time.”

  Joe was packing the machine away. “It’s a shame we can’t recruit ghosts to be spies for us. Send them off to watch things?”

  Maquire nodded. “That sort of surveillance would be helpful, would save officers. Can ghosts move about at will?”

  “We don’t know. They seem to be mostly stuck where they are until whatever changes and they can leave. But some do follow their bodies. Some could probably move where they wanted.”

  “Hmm,” and Maquire kept talking to Joe, “what you need is a load of funding and a proper research project in this, not hiding away.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “I take it you’re making notes on everything you do?”

  “Will that be a problem?”

  “No, just don’t leave them on the bus or anything. And you’re no closer to handing it over to third party scrutiny?”

  Joe didn’t have to yelp “No!” because putting a hand protectively on the rucksack was enough.

  “Just a question Joe, just a question. Questions are good in my line of work.”

  “They’ll break it.”

  “I guess they probably would.”

  “Is he out?” Bear asked, as he crouched next to Stride’s desk, although such was the bulk of the man he didn’t so much count as crouching as placing an immoveable object.

  “Yeah, he’s out, why?”

  “I’ve had an idea, come with me,” and Bear moved across the office. Stride followed as bid, but took his coffee with him.

  The room wasn’t huge, and they soon came to a halt. “Isn’t this Maquire’s desk?” Stride asked, knowing full well it was but wanting to introduce the subject.

  “Yes, yes it is isn’t it? And we’re working late, and there’s hardly any other detectives in the building, so…”

  “Ah, we’re going to look at his computer aren’t we?”

  “Oh yes we are.” Bear squeezed himself into Maquire’s normal sized chair.

  “You’ll crush that and he’ll know.”

  “But no complaints about looking?”

  “Do you really think he’d have written down what he’s up to?”

  “He might have made some sort of note somewhere.”

  “So you’re going to be using his computer all night looking?”

  “Yes, yes I am.”

  “In that case I’ll keep the coffee flowing and the door shut.”

  The night progressed much as the pair envisaged, with Bear poking through the internal recesses of Maquire’s files, a process which was technically breaking at least four rules in the detective handbook, and Stride hovering. And then…

  “Got something!”

  “Don’t shout, they’d have heard that in the cells.”

  “Okay, here we go. He’s been working with a group of private investigators.”

  “He’s gone civilian? How are they better than us?”

  “You didn’t let me finish, which I will now. A team of four investigators, of which is Joe le Tissier.”

  “I’ve heard of him.”

  “You’re thinking of the footballer.”

  “Shit, yeah. So he’s a genius then is he this le Tissier?”

  “No. No, but he’s got a machine that’s a genius.”

  “A what?”

  “There are multiple references in this to “Joe’s machine.””

  “What the fuck does that mean? Has he got some sort of super computer?”

  “Right, Stride, sit down.”

  “What?”

  “Sit down.”

  “Okay…”

  “Are you ready for this.”

  “Maquire will be back if you don’t stop fannying about.”

  “He says the machine talks to ghosts.”

  “Talks…ghosts, the white sheet things?”

  “Yes. Ghosts of dead people.”

  “My God he’s gone insane. We have a nutter leading us, is that how he does it, he’s insane and he can think like a mentalist?”

  “This isn’t Dexter. Or Hannibal. And I don’t think he’s insane.”

  “Well there aren’t ghosts. If there were ghosts we’d see aliens or dinosaurs or whatever.”

  “Stride, think about it. Maquire solves every murder thrown at him, and they’re now throwing them all at him. And he’s writing about a machine that talks to the best witness of all. The dead.”

  “Jesus, you think this is real.”

  “Yes, yes I do. And I’m pleased it is.”

  “Why? This is Harry Potter or some shit.”

  “He was a wizard, what, I have kids. Anyway, if Maquire is relying on a machine, great, because we can take the machine and we’ll use it and he won’t.”

  Stride’s eyes widened. “I don’t know whether I’m offended you want to steal something or how great that is.”

  “Stride my old mate, we are going to be legends.”

  The plan had been for Maquire to take the team to a second site, and see if that had any watching hosts. However, he had received a phone call, bid goodbye to the group, and driven straight to a hospital at high speeds. Maquire didn’t like hospitals one bit, and not just because every visit brought a case with more pain and misery. He’d broken a leg as a child and they’d kept him in overnight, and he still woke, even years later, to find himself in a cold sweat dreaming about that stay on a ward. He understood why people were spooked by hospitals, and didn’t wish to end up back there himself under any circumstances.

  Which was unfortunate, as his job had a habit of reminding him in the strongest possible terms about this fear.

  Maquire parked up, went inside and showed some ID, so he was soon being ushered through casualty and into a small cubicle. There was a bed here, and on it lay a young man. He was in a hospital gown, lying down on a bed but not under the sheets, and there was a mixture of white materials covering the top half of his head, where his eyes would have been.

  “Hello, I’m Detective Constable Maquire,” he said, and the man turned his head in the direction of the sound. “Are you ready to answer some questions?”

  “Yes…” came a weak voice, “yes.”

  “Good. Do you remember anything about what’s happened to you?”

  “I… I was walking, out walking, then… then I woke up. And my eyes…” His voice trailed off into anguish, and Maquire nodded. Just like the others, the poor bastard had no idea, which didn’t help the investigation one bit. Maquire presumed the medical report would list the same cocktail of drugs, and there had been no luck chasing up where someone could get them from, although his team had started looking at hospital staff records to see if anything stood out.

  This whole thing was a mess and it wasn’t getting better.

  “Wait,” Maquire said, as he refocused on the man, who was pulling the white layers off his face.

  “You need to see what they�
�ve done, you need to see…”

  “Nurse!”

  But the man had done it, and the detective was looking into two bloody holes, the dried dark red matter all that remained of the eyes. Maquire felt sick, and put a hand on the bed to steady himself. It was all he could do not to swear.

  “Find them…find them please…”

  “Yes, yes of course, I will do everything in my power.”

  “I need this to work,” Maquire said as he rang Dee and gave her the location they’d be visiting. It was morning now, and the detective had barely slept, seeing those two recesses every time he closed his eyes, and most of the time they were open. In fact he’d had to avoid breakfast, because he felt nauseous, and was even feeling a once in a lifetime repulsion to coffee. All he’d done was sip water.

  He parked up and went over to Dee’s car, which had arrived before him, and peered in.

  “Just the two of you this morning?” he said when he realised just Dee and Joe were inside.

  “Yes, sorry, Nazir and Pohl have prior appointments.”

  “But not together?”

  “No, not together.”

  “Yeah, that would have been weird.” Still, thought Maquire, the two essential people were here. Although it only needed Joe to turn the machine on, so why was Dee essential? “What we’ve got here is the site of the latest attack. Well, where they were found, but you know what I mean.”

  “We do,” and Dee smiled at him. All he could see were her eyes.

  “Where exactly are we?”

  “Old industrial estate, and by old and industry I mean they made textiles here when we still had factories.”

  “Going back a bit.”

  “Yes, but people died in these old mills, conditions were horrendous.”

  “Ah,” and Dee grinned, “so you think there’s a chance.”

  “Oh, I do, I do.”

  They’d soon set the equipment up, and Joe turned it on.

  “Are you the police?” came a desperate voice.

  “Yes,” Maquire said, do you have something to tell us?”

  “Yes, yes, it’s terrible, really terrible.”

  “Go on,” and he had his notebook ready.

  “The conditions in our mills was terrible, terrible, something should have been done.”

  “In your mills?”

  “Yes.”

  “In the mills which aren’t there anymore?”

  “The mill owners have descendants, they must do, and I’m sure my kids had…”

  Maquire shook his head. “We are not here to sort a compensation claim over a century late.”

  “Oh, what are you here for?”

  “A young man was dumped here recently, a man with no eyes.”

  “Oh, him.”

  “So you saw it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you see who did it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Right, can you describe them.”

  “A woman, stocky, not short.”

  “A woman?” Joe said in amazement.

  “Yes Joe,” Dee explained “women are perfectly capable of being psychos too.”

  “Tell me about it,” Maquire added.

  “Can you give me a description of the face please?”

  Soon Maquire had most of what he wanted, but the ghost could only remember the first half of the number plate, and that the car was red. But it was a start.

  “What will you do about the mill owners?” came the digital voice.

  “You’ll have to start a union or something.”

  “Of spirits?!”

  “Don’t give them ideas,” Dee cautioned.

  Two pairs of eyes were watching the scene from a distance, but that was where binoculars came in handy. A woman was stood, peering round the side of a building, and she saw Detective Maquire, who she knew was in charge of finding her, and two other people who most definitely weren’t police officers helping. Was that even allowed in law? And why were they stood around talking as if there was a fourth person? It was odd, and she was convinced this detective was losing the plot and would never be able to find her. Which was good, because she knew prison wouldn’t be conducive to her passion for eyes.

  But this morning had yielded something relevant to that, indeed it had revealed a gem. Of the two people with Maquire one was a tall, thin redhead, and while looks didn’t move the needle for the watcher, the redhead’s eyes certainly did. They were a wonderful deep green, and she oh so wanted to have them. Yes, she oh so did.

  And as the watcher saw them split up, get into cars and begin to leave, so the watcher got into hers to follow, because wanting had turned into acquiring. All it would take was the opportunity…

  The redhead’s car had pulled up a café in the middle of nowhere, and the pair had gone inside, so the Watcher pulled up too and did a quick loop of the building on foot. The café seemed almost deserted, as if someone had built it in the wrong spot, and there was just the pair she was following inside and a couple behind the counter serving. Interesting.

  The watcher went inside, but didn’t order a coffee as the redhead could be heard to say “get me a cappuccino, I need a piss,” as she disappeared down the side and through a door marked toilets. Interesting, and the watcher followed her, no eyes following, and soon the Watcher found herself in a small corridor, with two doors leading into toilets, a door leading back into the building… and a fire exit.

  This would be a risk, a great risk, but also a great high. Smiling, the Watcher removed a case from her pocket, and pulled out a syringe.

  Joe was sat drinking his coffee in the almost abandoned cafe Dee liked to frequent, and he was watching her cappuccino go cold. She’d been an awfully long time in the toilet, which was unlike her, and he was getting a bit bored to be honest, and looking like a man who’d been stood up. Which was bad enough in a posh restaurant, but here was galling. He had the rucksack on the chair next to him, and as he looked round, realised the place was empty, he reached in and flicked the machine on. Maybe this place was haunted, maybe he could have a chat with…

  “Quick, quick,” came a voice.

  “What?”

  “Your friend, the redhead, she’s been kidnapped.”

  “What?”

  “A woman, got a needle in her, carried her out the exit and the car drove off!”

  “Fucking fuck…did you get the licence plate?”

  “Yeah, I got it.”

  “And this just happened?”

  “No, you’ve been sat waiting for an hour.”

  “Fucknuts.”

  Stride was looking at the front door to Dee’s house. Smart place, mostly plastic so no need to paint, although the fittings looked new. Not that he was here to criticise the decor.

  “So the man who owns the machine is staying here?”

  “Yeah,” Bear confirmed, “I went round to check his place out, saw this big hole in front of it, spoke to a neighbour and found he’d moved out while the plumbing was repaired. In here with a friend.”

  “You say friend as if they’re shagging.”

  “Nah, friend as in another one of the investigators.”

  “Ah, I see. So have you got a key then?”

  “A key?” Bear looked askance.

  “Well we have to get in somehow.”

  “We’re burgling the place Stride, and taking something, we want it to look as random as possible, so we do this,” and the huge man shoulder charge the front door, which wrenched open with a pleasing crunch.

  “How silly of me,” Stride rolled his eyes.

  “You check upstairs, I’ll check down. We’re looking for wherever this Joe le Tissier is staying. I think it’s a house full of women, so look for some boxers or something.”

  It took two minutes to identify Joe’s room, and soon they were turning it upside down. It took longer to realise something else.

  “I can’t find any machine,” Stride explained, “but I’ve found plenty of drawings of it.”

&nbs
p; “Nope, me neither. Can’t find anything. Drawings?”

  “Yeah, there’s a folder filled with notes and stuff all about it.”

  “Right, pocket that, if the worst comes to the worst we can blackmail the bastard.”

  “Pohl!” came an anguished cry from downstairs. It was male, and sounded like the sort of person who’d design a machine. Stride peered out and down. Then he leaned back in and whispered “there’s some nerd with a big oblong bag. And we’re trapped.”

  “Machine sized bag?”

  “Pohl, I need Maquire’s number!”

  “Yeah. Absolutely.”

  Bear smiled evilly. “I’m never trapped mate, let’s go do this the old fashioned way,” Bear grinned, ran out of the bedroom and barrelled down the stairs. Joe was at the bottom, looking for Pohl in the lounge, and he didn’t have time to react to the huge figure who ran right into him, slamming Joe against a wall, and certainly didn’t have time to react to his bag being lifted up as the two intruders ran out.

  “You’re a maniac!” Stride called after Bear as they disappeared down the path. The one at the front was laughing on an adrenaline filled high.

  Joe was lying where he’d been crushed, finding it hard to breathe, unsure of what happened. It took him a while to realise someone was calling his name.

  “Mum? Mum?”

  “It’s Pohl, but that’ll do.

  “Mu…errr…”

  “What happened?”

  “They took Dee, they took Dee.”

  “They had your bag Joe, I saw it in their hands as they ran past me. Who were they?”

  “Ring Maq, ring Maq, they took Dee!”

  Given how long it could take to gain full consciousness after a night of drinking, Dee felt she woke up after this very quickly indeed. That was partly because when your head ached and the bed was so soft under you it was hard to move and instead you tunnelled up the duvet, hoping to cocoon yourself away until the pain stopped. Whereas here you try to curl up and find you can’t move your arms, because you can’t move your wrists, and your neck aches because your head is lolling down in front of you. So when you finally shake the grogginess out of your head, look down, and find you’re tied to a chair, you come the rest of the way out in one jolt of panic.

  “Why am I tied to a chair?” Dee wondered, and it crossed her mind she’d got into some bizarre sex game last night. Was Joe into this and would he soon enter the room dressed as a monkey? But as her eyes adjusted to the light, which was low but on, she realised all too well where she was.